Translation Ambushed in a Curial Cubbyhole

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The notion that the people should be central to liturgy, "the work of the church," is at the core of the liturgical movement affirmed by the Second Vatican Council that has flourished ever since.

That concept is not some novel idea developed as part of a "liberal" agenda in recent years. Rather it is the sense Of the council, understood deeply by those most involved in developing its thought. The centrality of the people of God was one of the more radical shifts in ecclesiology to come out of the council, and perhaps that is why it has come under such severe attack three decades later.

The word attack may seem a bit heavy-handed, but what else can be said of the revelations in John Allen's account (see page 3) of a group that met behind closed doors in the Vatican to bowdlerize the inclusive-language biblical …